Life, livelihood, homes gone in 2 major fires

An unidentified 45-year-old man was killed and nearly 2,000 families rendered homeless as fire spread through about 2,000 to 3,000 hutments in Appa Pada situated on a forest land in Malad East. About 200 shops in furniture market Jogeshwari West gutted by fire

Mumbai: The western suburbs of the city saw two massive fires on Monday. An unidentified 45-year-old man was killed and nearly 2,000 families rendered homeless as fire spread through about 2,000 to 3,000 hutments in Appa Pada situated on a forest land in Malad East at around 4.30 to 5pm. Earlier in the day, a fire in the furniture market in Jogeshwari West gutted nearly 200 shops and factories.

In Malad East, fire struck the area that has around 5,000 hutments situated on the forest land. While the fire was extinguished at around 11 pm, cooling operations are likely to go on till Tuesday (VIJAY BATE / HT PHOTO)

While there were no deaths or injuries reported in the Jogeshwari fire, locals said that goods and materials worth crores of rupees was gutted by the fire.

In Malad East, fire struck the area that has around 5,000 hutments situated on the forest land. While the fire was extinguished at around 11 pm, cooling operations are likely to go on till Tuesday. The fire site was visited by senior BMC officials, including additional municipal commissioner, Dr. Sanjeev Kumar.

BMC has set up temporary food and shelter facilities at Buva Salvi maidan, Chaitanya Hall and at a spot in front of Municipal Maternity Hospital, Malad East. The Mumbai Fire Brigade is inquiring into finding out if there are any injured or missing persons.

Kiran Dighavkar, assistant municipal commissioner, P North ward said, “Of the 2,000 affected, about 750 hutments are completely gutted while others are heavily damaged. We have moved people out from the area. We are setting up big pandals in nearby playgrounds where food and shelter will be provided to these families till further concrete steps are taken by the state government.”

Sriram Kadam, a resident, said, “Since the fire erupted early in the evening, people were able to make a quick exit to safety. However, quite a few cylinder blasts escalated the fire. Residents, who were a little away from the fire, were able to throw their LPG cylinders in the nearby nallah (drain) and well.”

Another resident Anish Yadav, said, “There are not many injuries because people escaped quickly. Some of those gutted are small shops and some are hutments.”

According to the press statement by Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC), at least 15–20-cylinder blasts led to the spread of fire over an area of 10,000 square meters.

In Jogeshwari, according to locals, the fire erupted in one of the wood factories at around 10:30am and spread to other shops quickly. The market, which is known for its antique furniture, has more than 200 small wood furniture factories and around 80 to 90 more furniture shops located on the SV Road at Jogeshwari.

According to a press statement by BMC, the fire was confined to the furniture market in the Ghas Compound, Opp Petrol pump, Relief Road, Jogeshwari (W).

Arif Khan, one of the shop owners, said, “It is like the complete market has vanished. We have saved whatever we could but the antique furniture shops are facing a major loss. Each of these antique furniture shops had more than ₹50 lakh worth of furniture.”

Parvez Khan, who works in one of the factories, said, “The fire started inside one of the factories and then spread to the whole market. Material worth crores of rupees has turned into ash.”

The fire that erupted between 10:30 am and 11am, was declared level 3 by fire brigade soon after and took seven hours to bring it under control and was extinguished by fire brigade at around 5:30pm.

As the fire was massive, the SV Road between Ram Mandir flyover and Jogeshwari was shut and five BEST bus routes were also diverted through Behraum Baug on Link Road.

Shop owners were seen lifting whatever furniture they could from the shops and moving it to the other side of the road. Since the area had a lot of ongoing infra projects, such as road, bridge work, water pipeline etc., a special crane was brought in to remove construction materials from the site to make way for fire brigade.

Shop owners were seen climbing up on the shops and then used a pipleline provided by the fire brigade to assist them in extinguishing the fire.